1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to mobile phones, and more particularly to the user interface of mobile phones.
2. Description of the Related Art
With many mobile phones, when entering text messages such as SMS (short message service) or address book entries on alphanumeric keyboards, the user must press each key one or more times for each letter to be entered. An alphanumeric group of characters (letters and numerals) presented on the display is associated with a particular key and each press of that key causes stepped movement of each character of the group through a cursor. The character under the cursor is then be entered into the message.
The order of initial presentation of the displayed group is constant and takes the format, for key xe2x80x9c2xe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cABC2xe2x80x9d so that a single key press would move the cursor to xe2x80x9cBC2Axe2x80x9d, two presses to xe2x80x9cC2ABxe2x80x9d et seq. In such a standard phone keypad arrangement, with xe2x80x9cABCxe2x80x9d on key xe2x80x9c2xe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cDEFxe2x80x9d on key xe2x80x9c3xe2x80x9d and so on, it is the case more often than not, that the required letter is the third letter on each key, requiring three key presses to enter the required letter.
Similarly when it is required to enter numerals within a text message four key presses will usually be needed for entry of each numeral. The incidence of numbers within text messages e.g. SMS is increasing. Further characters may be included for selection by each key i.e. ABC2xxx, where the characters xxx could be used to provide letters for use in non-English text, for example characters with circumflex or cedilla. Such further characters may be included in any calculation of frequency distribution but to avoid prolixity will not form part of the examples given.
Prior art methods include causing the cursor to skip quickly over unwanted letters or numerals by means of a long key press. When the key is held down for longer than a specified period (a long key press) the cursor continues to step through the characters displayed until pressure on the key is removed. When the key is held down for less than a specified period (a short key press) the cursor moves only to the next character displayed and remains at that character. It has been found that selection by means of long and short key presses does not appeal to the users of mobile phones.
It is an object of the invention to provide an improved user interface for mobile phones in which the selection of displayed characters is simplified and the time taken for character selection is reduced.
To achieve the above-described object, a mobile phone according to the present invention comprises an input means, a display, and a controller. The character group is stored associated with the input means in the controller. When a text messages is entered, the controller displays the character of the character group on the display in an order based on a normal frequency distribution for standard prose, whenever the input means is operated. A plurality of characters are allocated to each input means, and the input means is operated when the user enters a message. The display displays a plurality of characters allocated to each input means. A controller displays the characters on the display in an order that frequency occurrences based on a normal frequency distribution for standard prose is high whenever the input means is operated, and selects one character among character group displayed on the display by the subsequent operation of the input means by the user.
According to an embodiment of the present invention, when the previous selection of the user is a numeral, a numeral within each character group is displayed at the head of the character group.
According to another mobile phone of the present invention further comprises a frequency distribution table. The frequency distribution table stores frequency occurrences of each character in messages entered into or received by the mobile phone. The controller updates the frequency occurrence stored in the frequency distribution table whenever message is entered or received, and displays the characters on the display in an order that frequency occurrences stored in the frequency distribution table is high whenever the input means is operated, and selects one character among character group displayed on the display by the subsequent operation of the input means by the user.
An example of alternative input means suitable for small mobile phones such as pen phones is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,754,645 to Metroka et al.
The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description with reference to the accompanying drawings which illustrate examples of the present invention.